Apple iPhone hitting software development snags?

Apple Store“The Leopard delay announced last week may be a sign of software development trouble for the iPhone, according to checks with component makers by research firm iSuppli,” Electronista reports.

Electronista reports, “The group found that part suppliers are still slated to deliver the ingredients for the Apple device on time, suggesting that all the problems with the device rest with its software alone. Apple reportedly pushed the iPhone’s release ahead slightly from the rumored June 11 launch to late June to overcome the difficulty.”

“‘We’re hearing it’s mostly an issue with the complexity of the device,’ said iSuppli analyst Jagdish Rebello,” Electronista reports.

Full article here.

[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Another Irish Dude” for the heads up.]

Related article:
Apple delays Mac OS X Leopard until October 2007, blames iPhone – April 12, 2007

25 Comments

  1. It was delayed because of the following feature:

    Holographic video conference projection

    “note: up to 4 parties at one time, only…”

    This technology is under license from George Lucas himself, hence why Steve bought pixar from George back in the day. Any one who didnt see this comming was clearly blind!!!

  2. what issue???? did apple announce a delay in the iphone?

    where is this coming from? yea the iphone is complex and brand spanking new software is needed. so what? apple delayed leopard not iphone.

    geez

  3. Anyone ever heard of the research firm “iSuppli”?
    No, I didn’t either. But anyone and everyone’s trying to make some vague statement about iPhone or Leopard in order to catch some of the spotlight and get free publicity. Of course the iPhone’s going to be complex – no one’s ever done anything like it before, and of course its all software-based. Maybe I should also become an analyst and get paid for spouting the obvious.

  4. Apple “pushed” it ahead of the “rumored” June 11th date? Since the delay isn’t with the hardware, components, then it must be with the software? Since Apple said it’s re-allocating resources, and since Apple does not manufacture the components, isn’t it obvious that the time critical piece is the software (and related testing)? There a lot of speculation and obvious statements in this analysis.

  5. I don’t see why it’s such a big deal. It’s obvious that Apple uses Leopard lite for iPhone and since we know Leopard is not done, Apple needs to work extra hard with iPhone to finish/polish the softwares and to QA it to death because nobody wants to reboot their crashy phones. In fact, it’s nice to know that Apple takes the QA seriously. There is nothing that suggests a show-stopping problem.

  6. Its multithreaded, and those threads need very specific priorities, especially with slower phone hardware and a single core CPU, For the phone to work the way you want it to, and for it to remain responsive and totally functional no matter what you decide to have going, or what order you launch them from you have to have fsking awesome programming! and luckily thats one thing apple has. I am looking forward to its release, Apple wont release it if there are major glitches.

  7. This same article appeared in Business Week yesterday. I sent them the following comment, WHICH THEY REFUSED TO POST.

    This is in the “News Analysis” section. Shouldn’t it be in the “Pure Speculation” section instead?

    First off, Apple never said WHEN they pulled engineers off Leopard to work on the iPhone. It could have been months ago, so to assume that some last-minute problems have cropped up is pure speculation. There has been no sudden shift of personnel, just that you suddenly got the info that they did, just recently. The only person you interviewed who has actually touched the device (Doherty) says his tests reveal no problems, so why is this article otherwise trying to convince me that the iPhone is in trouble?

    Another thing… just because Leopard contains some “secret” features has no bearing at all on whether it would have shipped on time. If they weren’t secret, does that mean they would have been easier to implement?

    C’mon you guys. This is Business Week. Make some sense.

  8. There is a flood of third party software that wants a toehold on the new iPhone

    This is causing delays as Apple is trying to channel all this through their own online serrvice for the iPhone to maintain a check on quality of the code.

    Hosed iPhones is not a pretty sight.

  9. This is really an obvious non-news issue. The iPhone is such a new technology, we knew that developing the User Interface wouldn’t be all that easy, or the software to work on it. I’m still hoping that Apple will develop a true Mac OS X system on the iPhone instead of just some portable Linux UI made to look like the Mac OS.

    We’re all rooting for you Apple, and we’re confident that you’ll create a great product this June. Best of luck to you.

  10. One thing has puzzled me about the iphone. Steve Jobs demonstration and those that managed to use it at MacWorld in January showed that it worked flawlessly. Obviously there was more development to be done. Now all of a sudden it has software development issues. That a**hole Dvorack has said that a Cingular beta tester told him it has issues, crashing and making mistakes all the time. Even if Dvorack is telling BS (which I suspect he is), I’ve been trying to think what has changed since January. Then it hit me, Microsoft released Vista. Perhaps Apple has had to do a lot more development to make the iPhone compatible with the mess that is Vista, afterall iTunes still isn’t fully compatible. Therefore Leopard really was delayed (indirectly) because of Vista.

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